Reverend Greg

Critical Buddhism

In 1980 Buddhist Scholars and Soto Zen Priests Hakamaya and Matsumoto wrote a book entitled “Critical Buddhism”. Essays from their book and others have been included in the English translation “Pruning the Bodhi Tree, the Storm over Critical Buddhism”. This is not a friendly read, rather many of the essays, especially those penned by Jamie Hubbard, are written in the confounding and encoded style specific to Academia. This is not to say that I suffer from either a lack of education nor the patience to look up words I don’t immediately recognize, it’s just that academi-speak can be very tiresome.

As a drummer I used to listen to the upper-crust drummers, guys I learned from. Most of them were “Drummer’s Drummers”, the kind of guys that you could only appreciate if you actually had a fair amount of skill and knowledge to begin with. The irony is that most of these upper-level musicians make poor livings and drummers in this paradigm are often destined to only play drum clinics and seminars rather than real gigs with real audiences or selling records like real musicians. We all have our place in the universe I suppose.

But for writing - I clearly don’t like “communication to confound”. Where as I struggle to edit my writings to simplify, I often get the impression that Hubbard edits to add extra wording. Obviously he isn’t concerned about speaking to a wide audience.

Nonetheless, Critical Buddhism is really having it’s way with me.

The original authors tear apart a dearly held value about Buddhism and Buddhists, one regarding “wa” or harmony. Yeah, that’s the first thing most people who don’t know real Buddhism say “oh, Buddhism is so harmonious and peaceful”.

According to Hakamaya and Matsumoto, only the concepts of dependant origination and non-self are truly Buddhism. They state, quite authoritatively (which represents another subject they write at length about, authoritative writing) that the Buddha Shakyamuni was quite simply a critic, one who criticized the majority religion of his time. It is criticism itself that is truly Buddhist.

I Think I’m Turning Japanese

This doesn’t leave much left frankly, which is where “the storm” comes into play. Thousands of years of evolved teachings, art and culture are, quite simply, non-Buddhist. Surprised? Frankly I wasn’t. I’ve struggled with this very concept for decade(s). On a very simplistic level I began to question the role of Japanese art, culture and customs inside the Soka Gakkai. In the early 70’s before I began practicing it was quite popular to use Japanese language, customs and traditional Japanese Buddhist furniture and adjuncts in the practice of Nichiren Buddhism. Even in the 80’s it seemed there was a strong influence of “I think I’m turning Japanese”.

I experienced it in the 80’s and at the same time couldn’t help wondering what was truly Buddhist and what was merely Japanese. In the last few years it has started to evolve in my mind that it is difficult to discover true Buddhism in a Country that is traditionally Buddhist, a Country which had assimilated Buddhism hundreds of years prior. All religions, it seems, go through cultural assimilation. Even Jesus Christ was a critic in this connotation and the Catholic Church the ultimate assimilation.

Having been surrounded by the Japanese for longer than I can clearly recall and now having traveled to Japan for seven years I can see Japanese religious archetypes, specifically those faithful who truly seek the teachings of Buddhism and those who follow because it is their cultural identity to do so. While in SGI most are of the first type, I can honestly attest that there are those members who could as easily be Jodo Shinshu rather than Nichiren if their family members had encountered that sect first.

This is not meant as a cruel value judgment rather an observation.

In fact it is the Japanese authors of “Critical Buddhism” who state that a Japanese person cannot truly BE a true Buddhist, that Buddhism must be encountered and embraced outside of a culture in which it has been assimilated and mixed in with it’s indigenous religions. Ouch. It makes brutal sense however that only in a culture in which Buddhism is the critical voice against established religions can true Buddhism truly thrive.

Critical Buddhism, in it’s most brutal form, is problematic for Nichiren Buddhists. We actively practice and our very infrastructure, specifically our object of worship - the Gohonzon - exists in a Sino-Japanese framework. Were one actually motivated to construct a sectarian movement from the Critical Buddhism literary works they would have a difficult time doing so inside SGI or another Nichiren body. To excise all of Japanese culture would be artificially hostile, in my opinion.

The Case of Pop Buddhism

Critical Buddhism isn’t an easy pill to swallow. The front cover illustration is a withered tree stump with only two bare branches, one for dependant origination and the other for selfless-ness. Through the critical magnifying lens however such issues plaguing Nichiren Buddhism, the issue of the Daigohonzon for one, are swept away as utterly non-Buddhist. Nichiren himself seems to stand up very well to Critical Buddhist theory however, something I find curiously comforting.

Opposing Critical Theory is Topical Philosophy. I’ve spent the last two months desperately building a definition of “Topical Philosophy”, “Topos” and “Locus” in my mind where none resided previously. Hakamaya built the house of Critical Buddhism on the works of Western Philosophers Descartes and Vico, Descartes being an advocate of the Critical and Vico answering with his Topical. This was difficult for me as I lack training in classical Western Philosophy. I’ve pondered Hakamaya’s need to use Western thought to validate his own Eastern, but his house stands upon a firm foundation nevertheless.

Years ago I coined the term “Pop-Buddhism” in discussion son Zandakai, the first online SGI forum. I meant this to refer to the tendency of SGI members to accept anything they heard in regards to Nichiren Buddhism, and the rather ugly habit of little-knowing leaders to parrot things they had heard and never validated, or in some cases invented themselves.

One story I heard often was a prophecy in the Lotus Sutra about a man appearing in the final 500 years of the later day of the law. There is such a prophecy but it was made by Mialo, a disciple of Chi-I, Tientai and not in the Lotus Sutra. There were other tidbits - superstitions regarding how to set up and maintain your water cup, popular meanings for the use of incense, juzu beads and other details of our practice.

Larger forms of Pop Buddhism included the pseudo religion of the Woman’s Division administration of the World Tribune, our organ newspaper. Many Woman had been taught that there was “benefit” to be gained by taking care of World Tribune Subscriptions. This in fact isn’t completely bogus - any act of volunteerism, if performed with the right spirit - can lead to a positive experience. It’s called “cause and effect”. It was the teaching and passing on of this principle that formed Pop Buddhism.

Experiences and explanations of topics at discussion meetings were Pop Buddhist, including explanations of the Gohonzon I.e. “it’s a mirror…”, “it’s a karmic bank, you save then withdraw…”. This phenomena, seldom seen today due mostly to a vastly improved study program, was in fact “Topical Buddhism” on one level of the Critical Buddhist work. Pop, or Topical Buddhist thought includes happily all it encounters without question, and without criticism. As long as the source is an authoritative one, I.e. a leader, then all was included eagerly.

Harmony through Conflict

The problem remains what to do with conflict in Buddhism. None of us in the Buddhist world is without conflict, unless we aren’t truly studying. Kempon Hokke still remains the most orthodox in my opinion, with Nichiren Shu continuing on it’s happy way and Soka Gakkai waving the banner of “Soka Spirit!!!!”. Nichiren Shoshu still proclaims it’s superiority through it’s possession of the plank manadala and there are a myriad of cult-like cyber offshoots on the web, each with it’s proclamation of superior lineage to Nichiren.

Many unsuspecting Buddhist consumers still expect Buddhism and Buddhists to be harmonious and peaceful, and yet one look inside “Pruning the Bodhi Tree…” suggests differently. The mindset still exists that if you can’t beat them, you should join them. There are those who still firmly believe that if you can’t have faith that the Daigohonzon is of Nichiren’s hand, and was intended to be the ultimate Gohonzon, then you shouldn’t remain a member of either SGI or Nichiren Shoshu. Rarely do we decide in which sect to practice based on these issues, rather we use these issues as validations to our choices afterwards.

All we have to do to remain Buddhist about this all is simply not to beat each other up or start a war over all of it. We all make our choices, more often on principles much less defined than what sect is most correct. If we can continue to criticize without hating, dialoging without fighting, then we can continue to act Buddhist while being Buddhist.

Posted by revgreg at January 3, 2007 06:44 AM